Help:How to edit a page
:See also and Media Help Editing. is a Wiki, which means that anyone can easily edit any unprotected article and have those changes posted immediately to that page. Editing a Wiki page is quite simple. Just click on the "edit" tab at the top (or the edit link on the right or bottom) of a Wiki page. This will bring you to a page with a text box containing the editable text of that page. If you just want to experiment, please do so in the Sandbox instead of on other pages. Alternatively, you can press the "Show preview" button instead of actually saving the page. You should write a short in the small field below the edit-box. You may use shorthand to describe your changes; a list of these notations can be found at . You can also see what changes you have made in comparison to the previous version by pressing the Show changes button. If you're happy with what you see, then press "Save" and your changes will be immediately applied to the article. Don't " " edits you make to regular articles; the software keeps track of who makes every change. This also allows vandalism to be reverted easily when it does occur. You can also click on the "Discussion" tab to see the corresponding , which contains comments about the page from other users. Click on the "+'''" tab to add a new section, or edit the page in the same way as an article page. When editing talk pages, please '''do "sign" your comment, see . Tips on editing articles Always use a responsible point of view, as is not a place to post unrelated information or diatribes against your least favorite character. We do maintain a less stringent neutral point of view standard than Wikipedia (because we want to include fan theories and discussion), but that does not make it a free-for-all. It is encouraged to show multiple sides of an argument in a fair and rational manner. Cite your sources so others can check and extend your work. One of the goals of is to become a central repository for this sort of information, but it is not acceptable to plagiarize from other sites to do so. If you are the author of a post elsewhere, of course, we encourage you to include that information here, with credit to the original site. Please see for more information about formatting your source information on a consistent manner. After making a new page, it's a good idea to: *use What links here (with your page displayed) to check the articles that already link to it, and make sure that they are all expecting the same meaning that you have supplied; and *use the Search button to search for your topic title—and possible variants—to find articles that mention it, and make links from them if appropriate. Minor edits When editing a page, a user can mark that edit as being "minor." Minor edits generally mean spelling corrections, formatting, and minor rearrangement of text. It is possible to hide minor edits when viewing Recent changes. Marking a significant change as a minor edit is considered bad behavior, and even more so if it involves the deletion of some text. If one has accidentally marked an edit as minor, the person should edit the source once more, mark it major (or, rather, ensure that the check-box for "This is a minor edit" is not checked), and, in the summary, state that the previous change was a major one. Major edits All editors are encouraged to be bold, but there are several things that a user can do to ensure that major edits are performed smoothly. Before engaging in a major edit, consider discussing proposed changes on the article discussion/talk page. If doing a lengthy edit, consider working in rather than with the entire article; this helps reduce edit conflicts. Once the group of edits has been completed, the inclusion of an edit summary on the talk page will assist in documenting the changes. These steps will all help to ensure that major edits are well received and organized in a way that facilitates collaboration. Wiki markup The wiki markup is the simplified syntax you can use to format a Wiki page. In the left column of the table below, you can see what effects are possible. In the right column, you can see how those effects were achieved. In other words, to make text look like it looks in the left column, type it in the format you see in the right column. You may want to keep this page open in a separate browser window for reference, or take a screen-shot of it. If you want to try out things without danger of doing any harm, you can do so in the Sandbox. Try opening the Sandbox in a separate window or tab and keeping this page open for reference. ---- Meta-Wikimedia version of this page Links and URLs Images Only images that have been uploaded to Wikipedia can be used. To upload images, use the . You can find the uploaded image on the . See the Wikipedia's image use policy as a guideline used on Wikipedia. For further help on images, including some more versatile abilities, see the topic on Extended image syntax. Character formatting (see also: Wikipedia:Chess symbols in Unicode) Table of contents At the current status of the wiki markup language, having at least four headers on a page triggers the TOC to appear in front of the first header (or after introductory sections). Putting __TOC__ anywhere forces the TOC to appear at that point (instead of just before the first header). Putting anywhere forces the TOC to disappear. See also compact TOC for alphabet and year headings. Tables There are two ways to build tables: *in special Wiki-markup (see Wikipedia:Help:Table) *with the usual HTML elements: , , or . For the latter, and a discussion on when tables are appropriate, see Wikipedia:How to use tables. Variables See '' Templates The MediaWiki software used by Wikipedia has support for templates. This means standardized text chunks (such as boilerplate text) can be inserted into articles. For example, typing will appear as "''This article is a stub. You can help Wikipedia by expanding it." when the page is saved. See Wikipedia:Template messages for the complete list. Other commonly used templates are: for disambiguation pages, for spoiler warnings and like an article stub but for a section. There are many subject-specific stubs for example: , , and . For a complete list of stubs see Wikipedia:WP:WSS/ST. Hiding the edit links Insert __NOEDITSECTION__ into the document to suppress the edit links that appear next to every section header. More information on editing wiki pages You may also want to learn about: * * Informal tips on contributing to Wikipedia * Why not to rename pages boldly, at Wikipedia:How to rename (move) a page * Preferred layout of your article, at the Wikipedia:Guide to layout (see also Wikipedia:Boilerplate text) * Style conventions in the Wikipedia:Manual of Style and Wikipedia:Category:Wikipedia style guidelines * An article with annotations pointing out common Wikipedia style and layout issues, at Wikipedia:Annotated article * General policies in Wikipedia:Policies and guidelines * Wikipedia:Naming conventions for how to name articles themselves * Help on editing very large articles * If you are making an article about something that belongs to a group of objects (a city, an astronomical object, a Chinese character…) check if there is a WikiProject on the group and try to follow its directions explicitly. * Wikipedia:Help:Formula * Mediawiki user's guide to editing * Wikipedia:MediaWiki - About the software that runs Wikipedia